History of La Salle County, Illinois, Part 10

Author: Hoffman, U. J. (Urias John), b. 1855
Publication date: 1906
Publisher: Chicago : S.J. Clarke Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 1286

USA > Illinois > LaSalle County > History of La Salle County, Illinois > Part 10

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THOMAS PARR'S STATEMENT.

I came to Illinois in 1834, arriving about the 20th day of April. Then Illinois was a wild country. I went to Chicago to. the land sales of 1835, when Chicago was a very small town. Great numbers of the settlers came in every day to enter their lands. You could see them coming with their prairie schooners, drawn by about three yoke of oxen, through the high grass, from knee- high to the top of a tall man's head, with a cloud of mosquitoes following, about the size of an ordinary swarm of bees. Chicago then resem- bled about as good a swamp as I ever saw. From

PAST AND PRESENT OF LA SALLE COUNTY.

Berry's Point to Chicago, ten miles, we waded through water all the way about knee deep. The buildings in Chicago were a kind of cabin stuck in the mud.

We got our land and came home. Pretty wild times-chasing prairies wolves, scaring droves of deer, flocks of sand-hill cranes, geese and ducks. There were a good many Indians in the country then, and we were but little better, in appearance, ourselves. There were no proud folk in the country then, although the girls were as pretty as ever I saw. I settled on the right bank of the Fox River, eight or nine miles from Ottawa, where I have lived ever since. We had the whole country to pasture, and to cut hay in, and al- though we could raise good crops, we could get no money to give for building railroads, and hardly enough to pay the Methodist preacher for hearing him, although we always managed to pay him for marrying us. I had George Dun- navan and John Hoxie for neighbors ; the rest of the country north and west was an unbroken wilderness. The settlers had a good many slow notions : three or four yoke of oxen to turn the prairie ; and going to mill or market we would hitch our oxen to the big wagon, and be gone two or three days, or a week, as the case re- quired-rather a slow coach, but a never failing one, unless an ox strayed. The news was car- ried by ox telegraph. There was not so much style, nor so many big steals, as now. Those unfortunate individuals who worshiped fine ·horses were kept in a perpetual state of excite- ment by a gang of bandits all over the Western country, who lived mostly by stealing horses.

We used to go to Chicago to do our marketing, and sell our wheat. With an ox team and wagon, I would put on a good load of wheat, and start for Chicago. By the time I reached Indian Creek, two or three more teams would join, and as we proceeded others would fall in, when we reached Chicago a hundred teams would be in the train.

We took along the old tin coffee pot, and some ground coffee tied up in a rag, and a few cook- ing utensils. We would camp, light a fire, cook our grub, collect around the fire, tell a few stories, crack a few jokes, crawl under our wagons, and, if the mosquitoes would let us, go to sleep and dream of our wives and children at home.

We would get forty to fifty cents per bushel for wheat, and three cents a dozen for eggs, and. if we got sixty cents for wheat we thought we were doing a land office business. Our teams found plenty of excellent pasture on the prairie wherever we stopped. Crossing the sloughs was an item of excitement, and if one got stuck, we

joined teams and pulled him out. Crowding Frink & Walker's stage coaches was a favorite pastime, and they soon learned to give the hubs of a six-ox wagon a wide berth.

CLAIMS, AND FIRST IMPROVEMENTS. (From Baldwin's History.)

Future generations will inquire, not only how this country appeared before the hand of civilized man had marred its virgin beauty, but how the first comers managed to live, to protect them- selves from the elements, and to procure the means of subsistence ; how they met the varied requirements of civilization to which they had been accustomed, and with what resignation they dispensed with such as could be had.

If correctly told, it would be a tale of intense interest ; but it would require a master- hand to draw a picture that would show the scene in all of its details-personal experience alone could fully unfold the tale. When a new comer arrived, he first selected a location where he could make his future home; and the question naturally arises, of whom did he get permission to occupy it? The answer might be given in the language usually used when defining political, or civil rights-every one was free to do as he pleased, so he did not interfere with his neighbor. When the Government had extinguished the In- dian title, the land was subject to settlement, either before, or after survey. The settler had no paper title, but simply the right of possession, which he got by moving on and occupying it; this gave him the right to hold it against all others, till some one came with a better title, which better title could only be got by purchas- ing the fee of the Government, when surveyed and brought into market. The right of posses- sion thus obtained constituted what was called a claim. These were regarded as valid titles by the settlers, and were often sold, in some in- stances, for large amounts. Pre-emption laws were passed at different times, by Congress, giv- ing to claimants who had made certain specified improvements, the exclusive right to purchase the premises, at the minimum price of $1.25 per acre ; provided, they would prove their pre-emp- tion, and pay for the same, before they were of- fered for sale by the Government. The condi- tions required were possession, or cultivation, and raising a crop, the amount of the crop not being specified. A rail fence, of four lengths, was often seen on the prairie, the ground en- closed, spaded over and sown with wheat.

PAST AND PRESENT OF LA SALLE COUNTY.

When two settlers, by mistake, got a pre-emp- tion on the same quarter section, they were en- titled to a claim on eighty acres more, to be selected by themselves ; they received a certificate of such claim, it being called a float, and was frequently laid on improvements, doing great injustice.

But there was always an understanding among the settlers that each claimant should be protected in his claim if he had no pre-emption, provided he would attend the sale when advertised, by proclamation of the President, and bid the min- imum price, and pay for it. The settlers usually attended the sale in a body, and although any per- son had a legal right to bid on any claim not pre- empted, and it had to be sold to the highest bid- der, it was not considered a very safe thing to bid on a settler's claim, and it was seldom done. When attempted, the bidding speculator usually got roughly handled, and found discretion the better part of valor. Eastern speculators often complained of this, claiming that they were de- prived of the legal right to compete in the open market, for the purchase of these lands; but the settlers replied that they had left the comforts and luxuries of their Eastern homes. braved the dangers and privations of a new coun- try, and here made their homes, cultivating and reclaiming these wild lands, and preparing the way for advancing civilization, and that they had a sacred right to the improvements, and the right to purchase the fee of the land, as the land and improvements must go together-and they were right.

The first crop was mostly corn, planted by cut- ting a gash with an axe into the inverted sod, dropping the corn and closing it by another blow alongside the first. Or it was dropped in every third furrow and the furrow turned on; if the corn was so placed as to find the space between the furrows it would find daylight; if not, it was doubtful. Corn so planted would, as cultivation was impossible, produce a partial crop, some- times a full one. Prairie sod turned in June would be in condition to sow with wheat in Sep- tember, or to put in with corn or oats the spring following. Vines of all kinds grew well on the fresh turned sod, melons especially, though the wolves usually took their full share of these. After the first crop, the soil was kind, and pro- duced any crop suited to the climate. But when his crops were growing, the settler was not re- lieved from toil. His chickens must have shelter. closed at night to protect them from the owls and wolves ; his pigs required equal protection ; and although his cows and oxen roamed on the wide prairie in a profusion of the richest pasture, still a yard must be made for his cows at night, and

his calves by day. The cows were turned in with the calves for a short time at night, and then the calves turned on the prairies to feed during the night ; in the morning the calves were turned in and the cows turned out for their day's pas- ture ; this was necessary to induce the cows to come up at night, for if the calves were weaned the cows would fail to come. And the stock all needed some protection from the fierce wintry blast, though sometimes they got but little. Add to this, the fencing of the farm, the out-buildings, hunting the oxen and cows on the limitless prairies through the heavy dews of late evening and early morning, going long distances to market and to mill, aiding a newcomer to build his cabin, fight- ing the prairie fires which swept over the country yearly, and with his family encountering that pest of a new country, the fever and ague, and other malarious diseases, and the toil and endurance of a settler in a new country may be partially, but not fully appreciated.

Crossing the wide prairie at night, with not cven the wind or stars for guides, was a very un- certain adventure, and often the wayfarer trav- eled till exhausted, and encamped till the morning light should guide him on his way. In warm weather, although an unpleasant exposure, this was not a dangerous one ; and although the sensa- tion of being lost is more irksome, and the lonely silence in the middle of a prairie, broken only by the howl of the wolves, is more unpleasant than one inexperienced would imagine, and the gnaw- ing of a stomach innocent of supper, adds much to the discomfort, it all passes with the night, and a brighter view and happier feelings dawn with the breaking morn. But crossing the trackless prairie when covered with a dreary expansc of snow, with the fierce, unbroken wintry blasts sweeping over its glistening surface, penetrating to the very marrow, was sometimes a fearful and dangerous experience. No condition could in- spire a more perfect idea of lonely desolation, of entire discomfort, of helplessness, and of dismal forebodings, than to find one's self lost on the snow-covered prairie, with no object in sight in any direction but the cold, undulating snow wreaths, and a dark and tempestuous winter night fast closing around his chilled and exhausted frame. His sagacious horse, by spasmodic efforts and continuous neighing, shows that, with his master, he appreciates the danger, and shares his fearful anticipations. With what longing the lost one reflects on the cozy fireside of his warm cabin, surrounded by his loved ones, which he fears hc may never see : and when the dark shad- ow of night has closed around and shut in the landscape, and chance alone can bring relicf. a joyous neigh and powerful spring from his

PAST AND PRESENT OF LA SALLE COUNTY.

noble horse, calls his eye in the direction he has taken, he sees over the bleak expanse a faint light in the distance, toward which his horse is bound- ing with accelerated speed, equally with his mas- ter cheered and exhilarated by the beacon light, which the hand of affection has placed at the win- dow, to lead the lost one to his home. Nearly every early settler can remember such an experi- ence, while some never reached the home they sought, but, chilled to a painless slumber, they found the sleep that knows no waking.

ELMER BALDWIN.

BY ELIJAH DIMMICK.

My parents, Daniel and Rachel (Leonard) Dimmick, in 1828 (the year I was fourteen years of age) left Richland County, Ohio, for the prai- rie country of Illinois with their family and household goods, making the trip with one ox team and one horse team, coming via Springfield and Dayton, Ohio, to Indianapolis, crossing the Wabash at Clinton, Indiana, crossing the Illinois River at Peoria; thence to Bureau County, set- tling, in May of that year, six miles southeast of the present city of Princeton, on Blue River. We were unable to raise any crop for subsistence the following winter, and I will relate my trip to mill, including the trip made to get something with which to go to mill :

My father and myself, in the fall of 1828, started out to exchange our labor for corn to sub- sist upon the coming winter. To find cornfields was the first object. Proceeding to Peoria, thence to Fort Clark, camping by permission of Captains Bogardus, Eads and Stillman inside the inclosure (Stillman was the hero of battle of Stillman's Run with Black Hawk in 1832) ; from Fort Clark we went to Thomas Hartwell's trad- ing post, between Fort Horn (now La Salle) and Fort Hennepin. There we procured an In- dian canoe, rigging the same with sails and pad- dles. Laying in provisions, we proceeded to Peo- ria Lake. Securing our canoe and going two miles west of the lake, we worked the season at husking for a Mr. Powell, receiving for wages what was more necessary to us than money- corn. Loading our craft with the golden harvest, we poled and paddled and sailed back to Hart- well's trading post (making in the canoe a trip of 160 miles ). The next day we returned home, and, with our ox team, together went to Hart- well's for the corn. Sacking the same and plac- ing it on poles over the top of the wagon, we forded the river and returned home. Shelling our corn, we thence started for the mill. Cross- ing the river again at Hartwell's we proceeded to Thomas Gallaher's horse-mill, fifteen miles south-

east of Hennepin. Of course we could not take our meal home with us, but returning for it at the time agreed upon, making another trip of fifty-four miles, it may well be believed that when we did get that corn meal and my good Penn- sylvania mother to bake it, with perhaps some pumpkin in it, it made a dish fit for a prince, es- pecially as we had plenty of milk from our Ohio cows and had only to go into the woods to gather wild honey. With us, even in the pio- neer days, the land flowed "with milk and honey." Corn I have since seen so cheap as to be used for fuel and it hardly paid day wages for haul- ing, but in those times a man who had corn was a capitalist ; corn would have been king had we had the corn.

But to show the necessity of what since has been so cheap, I will state that in procuring that corn and converting the same into meal, 364 miles were made by land and river, going and returning, and if any two men in the United States ever made a longer trip for bread, I would be glad to take off my hat to them.

For the information of many of the people of today, I will say that Fort Horn was situated about forty rods above where the canal has its junction with the Illinois River. Government supplies reached there from St. Louis. Several small frame buildings sheltered the few inhab- itants of those days. Fort Horn was named for Horn, of the firm of Horn & Wilburn, Govern- ment supply contractors, who operated a steam- boat from St. Louis to the fort. I worked a part of the year of 1830 for Mr. Wilburn, near Shulls- burg, Wisconsin.

In 1829 my father changed his residence, mov- ing to "King Grove," afterward called "Dim- mick Grove," near where La Moille now stands. In the spring of 1830 my father was elected Jus- tice of the Peace; his commission was signed by Governor Reynolds.

In the spring of 1832 the Sacs and Foxes, un- der Black Hawk, made war on the white settle- ments. At that time about five families lived at our grove. We were warned of our danger by that faithful old friend of the whites, the Chief Shabbona. We all went to Fort Hennepin. The excitement that followed the murder of Mr. Hall and his wife and others, and the carrying off of the Hall girls at the Indian Creek settlement, can be imagined by none.

An anecdote connected with our stay at Hen- nepin I will relate : One night I had been placed on guard duty ; my post was a large oak tree beside the prairie; my watch was till midnight. To avoid a drizzling rain and to keep my gun dry, I lay down by the tree with my gun under my blanket. I fell asleep. The cattle of the

PAST AND PRESENT OF LA SALLE COUNTY.

people at the fort, in roaming around, discov- ered a strange object (myself) and commenced bellowing and crowding around me. One more bold than the others in the darkness put his nose upon me. Then it was I was fully awakened and supposed the Indians had me sure. I jumped to my feet, my blanket spreading out ; the cattle stampeded. All parties were scared, myself thoroughly so, as I can testify. I told the story as a joke upon myself and narrowly escaped a court-martial, but placed as I was to stand as a sentinel, with every reason to believe the hostiles were near us, I was severely reprimanded. I was very tired and unconsciously fell into a deep slumber, and perhaps too young, being only eighteen years, for a responsible position. The year after the war ( 1833) securities from further attacks being guaranteed by the capture of Black Hawk and his warriors, my father settled on section 26 of this township. Here he lived the rest of his life; was an active citizen, respected and honored. The people, in naming the town- ship, gave it his name, at the suggestion of Tim- othy Shea, Sr.

March 31, 1853, I was united in marriage with Caroline Foote, of Eden Township, by Rev. R. C. Bristol. The Reverend in a published notice of the event said: "Mr. Dimmick once got his Foote in Eden." In concluding I will say, that if any man should have predicted that I, who had made a trip of 364 miles for corn-meal and fled with our family to avoid massacre by Indians, should ever live to see the county the home of 80,000 prosperous s people, churches, school- houses, railroads and civilization all around us, I would have pronounced him a lunatic.

RECOLLECTIONS OF WILLIAM WARREN.

William Warren, of Serena township, is now one of the oldest settlers in the county, coming in 1836, when he was eight years old. His state- ment is full of interest in that it gives us a clear idea of the times. He says : "I was born in Erie- ville, New York, June 28, 1828. The first thing I can recollect was the summer I was three years old. I was wading in a creek and was carried beyond my depth. My father has told me it took a doctor two hours to bring the breath back into my body. My mother taught me my letters and to spell words of two syllables. I started to school to a man named Blackman. He first ques- tioned me how far I had advanced. I told him I got as far as "Baker" in the Elementary Speller. He gave me that lesson to learn and showing me a strap about eighteen inches long and three-fourths of an inch at one end and tapering to a point at the other, said he would give me a cut in the

hand every time I missed a word. I missed the first word and got the cut. I missed the second and the third and got a cut each time. In two weeks he had me whipped out of the spelling book, I think I never recovered from those two weeks of schooling.

In October, 1836, my father, Nathan Warren, with my mother, my sister, two years younger than myself, and my mother's sister started for Illinois in a covered wagon. To me this was a pleasant ride, through New York state, crossing the Niagara River, seven miles below the falls into Canada, through Canada, crossing the St. Clair River at Detroit on a horse ferry, through Michigan and Indiana, round the lake to Chicago. We got our dinner at a grocery store .kept in a log house. I have heard my father say he was offered eighty acres of land for his horses and wagon. After dinner we started for La Salle County. The first eight miles we waded knee deep in water. We passed through Naperville and Aurora, down the Fox River, the road run- ning about where the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad now runs. On the 20th of Oc- tober we arrived at the house of my uncle, John Warren. The house stood on section 17, about eighty rods southwest of where Pleasant Hill Union Church now stands. I remember that one of my cousins died from the effects of calo- mel given to cure the bilious fever.

The first school to which I was started to fin- ish the splendid education started in the two weeks in York State, was in a double log house. The two log houses were about sixteen feet square and set ten feet apart. The roof extended over the space between the houses. The roof and floor were made of puncheons. To make these a log was cut about four feet long and then split into strips two inches thick and as wide as could be and then evened up with a broad ax. A hole was dug in the middle of the house for a cellar. Eight or nine puncheons in the floor were left loose to be removed when one wished to go into the cellar. The door opened on the inside and was fastened with a latch. The buckskin string. which raised the latch, hung on the outside. The furniture consisted of a black walnut board forming a shelf around three sides of the room serving as a desk. We sat on benches made of slabs. The legs were driven in holes in the slabs and there were no backs.

One rainy night a cow and two steers went under the shed part of the house and finding the salty buckskin hanging at the door began to chew it and in so doing raised the latch and pushed the door open. The three went into the school room and the door closed after them. I was the first one at school that morning. It seems that

PAST AND PRESENT OF LA SALLE COUNTY.

the cattle were in search of learning. They ex- amined all the school books and dropped them on the floor. A steer in walking about the room misplaced the puncheons and fell into the cellar. I found the cow standing by one of the desks chewing her cud and the steer in the cellar chew- ing his cud. It took five men to get the steer out and that ended the school for that term. I went to school the last time when I was about eighteen years old and the schools were about the same.

After my mother's death I was not much at home. I had not been sick a day in Illinois until after her death. A week after that I was taken sick with bilious fever and then with the ague. For a year I was not of much account. When I was again able I went to work for my uncle Daniel in a brick yard, my father getting my wages. I have worked for my board, for 25 cents a day, ten dollars a month and twelve dollars a month is the most I ever got. The working hours were from sunrise to sunset.

In the spring of 1849 I worked at the car- penter trade for Messrs. Watson and Lukins. We did work in Serena. Freedom and Ophir townships. The first of July the Asiatic cholera broke out. There was little work done for a month. The well were kept busy caring for the sick and burying the dead.

In March, 1850. I started for California in company with my Uncle John Warren and Sam- uel Cody, Allen Miner, Caleb March and James Butler, my old school teacher, who kept a diary in shorthand but lost it at Salt Lake, Utah. The 5th of August we arrived at Hangtown, Eldo- rado County, California. We remained two years and had all sorts of experiences and luck. I started home on the 15th of October. 1852, and arrived November 15th. I had saved $1.500 and with this I bought 160 acres in section 5 adjoin- ing that of my father and began to improve it. In March, 1855, I married Delia A. Flint. We raised six children, Warren A., Horace G., Ge- neva B., Lew E., Harry H. and John S. All are living except Geneva, who married John F. Woolson and died at Fort Scott, Kansas, in 1889. My wife died in 1893 and I married Louisa Gran- tees in 1895. We are living on the farm where I began married life in 1855.

My father was a Whig and my grandfather on mother's side was a Democrat. Whenever they met they got into an argument and both being combative, before they separated they were calling each other Federals and Tories. Of course I thought my father got the best of the argument. I therefore started as a Whig and cast my first vote for General Scott. It was on the Star of the West on the Gulf of Mexico on

my way home from California. This vote was taken to test the sentiment on the boat. As I remember, it was unanimous for Scott. The Whig party went down and out, its adherents joining the anti-slavery movement.

I heard the celebrated Lincoln-Douglas de- . bate in Ottawa. I can not remember what they said, but I do recall that I was convinced that Douglas was the greatest speaker that I ever heard and that from what Lincoln said I got the impression that he was the most honest man. So I started out a Republican. When I have ta- ken any part at all it has been with the Repub- lican party. When I thought both parties depart- ed from principle, I stepped aside and looked on.

This was written June 28th, 1906, my seventy- eighth birthday. If this imperfect sketch is of in- terest to anyone. I am repaid for my trouble.

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History of La Salle County, Illinois, Part 10

Author: Hoffman, U. J. (Urias John), b. 1855 Publication date: 1906 Publisher: Chicago : S.J. Clarke Pub. Co. Number of Pages: 1286

Author: Hoffman, U. J. (Urias John), b. 1855
Publication date: 1906
Publisher: Chicago : S.J. Clarke Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 1286